


You Gotta, You Gotta Give Up

by tunteeton



Series: Figure It Out [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Billy Helps, But Not For the Swearing, I Apologise For The Italics, I Replaced All the Sex With Swearing, John Gets Introspective, M/M, Nothing Happens To Me, Swearing, Texting, and italics, post series 3, so much swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-22
Updated: 2014-08-22
Packaged: 2018-02-14 07:03:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2182395
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tunteeton/pseuds/tunteeton
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes, all it takes is a couple of nights and a skull on a pillow.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Gotta, You Gotta Give Up

**Author's Note:**

> This fic belongs to the same universe as Drunk on Night River, so you might want to read that one first if you haven't already.

There's nothing on TV. John flicks through the channels anyway, feet tapping a restless rhythm on the floorboards. Football. Politics. Reruns of reruns. Celebrity cooks and their loud friends. But John can't take smiling people today, or explosions, or boredom for that matter. He snarls at the remote and turns the telly off, reads the goddamn text yet again.

_An errand for Mycroft. I'll come back home for dinner. SH_

John stares at the offending text, eyebrows drawn together. What fresh fuckery is going on behind his back this time? He knows the Holmes brothers have worked better together ever since that Magnussen case went tit over heels, but this really steals the cake.

For Sherlock to run errands for his dearest brother, there must be something tremendous happening. Terrorist attacks, Moriarty reviving himself for the second time, the Black Death resurfacing. And they've left John out of it, again. Shit, they really must think him a useless nuisance, don't they? He considers calling Mycroft and yelling at him until someone comes to collect him, too. He considers calling Sherlock. But.

He sighs, makes up his mind. Sends a short answer.

_Fine. I'll make pasta._

John Watson, housewife.

He chops the onions and the tomatoes. He hesitates, then boils the water. He sets the table for two, even locates the matches and lights a candle despite the ridiculousness of it. It kills a couple of minutes, after all. More time for Sherlock to show up. John paces from the kitchen to the living room windows and back again, and doesn't eat before the food has grown cold and his stomach is tying itself into knots which have nothing to do with hunger. He, very carefully, doesn't think about Sherlock at all. He most certainly doesn't think about the possibility of gunshots or blood or the everlasting, creeping silence inside the flat. He knows it well enough. He doesn't need a repeat performance.

The thing is, John doesn't own Sherlock. No matter how much he'd like to follow him everywhere or protect him from any harm, he can't. He doesn't have that kind of claim over him, never did and never will have. Sherlock is still the same inconsiderate bastard who shrugged off the whole Irene fiasco, who jumped off a freaking building and let John believe him dead for two terrible years, who came back in the most stupidly, ignorantly painful manner possible. Sherlock hurts people and Sherlock gets hurt. John is the one who runs after him, apologises to every direction and more often than not ends up the butt of the joke anyway. If Sherlock would only -

His phone beeps. He doesn't rush to it.

Not rushing takes surprisingly much effort, but if his hands were any steadier they'd turn to stone.

_Will be over the night. SH_

No explanation, no apology, no way in fucking hell. This time, he does call Mycroft.

“It's nothing for you to bother yourself with,” comes the short answer, and then big brother hangs up on him. John doesn't even have time to open his mouth, to say hello.

“Fuck you,” he tells the dead line. It's always possible Mycroft hears anyway.

–

He makes himself busy around the flat. The floors need vacuuming, the kitchen rubbing. He re-reads the bland newspapers and loop-listens to BBC World News, trying to figure out what the Holmes brothers are involved in this time. Nothing unusual seems to going on. It's mostly talk about politics, weather and sport, none of which interests Sherlock in the slightest. There are no scandals, no mysterious disappearances or deaths that he can spot. All in all, it's a remarkably slow evening news-wise. Must be Mycroft's doing, just to spite one ex army doctor out off his mind. Damn Mycroft, he's succeeding too. John hates every second of it.

It's only when he catches himself in the bathroom, collecting buckets and seriously considering washing the windows, that he gives up. No. His amusement and wellbeing are not dependant on Sherlock's proximity. He's an individual, an adult with his own life, own interests. This moping has to stop. He's spent more than enough time weeping after Sherlock, he'd like to think. He's better than that nowadays. He's getting better. He should start acting his part, not be like some lovesick teen. 

Lovesick.

He lets out an ugly burst of laughter and escapes the bathroom. Lovesick? If only, if only... But wouldn't that be something? An actual romantic relationship with Sherlock fucking Holmes? As if that could ever happen. Sherlock's not built for that. John's not at all sure what Sherlock _is_ built for, but a relationship certainly is not the thing.

_[John. There's something I should tell you. Something I always meant to say but never have.]_

The thought makes him stop on the spot. There had been moments when he'd almost believed otherwise. Terrible, stressful moments followed by terrible, stressful times. Partings and feeble jokes, and he still doesn't know what they meant, what was real and what was just another smokescreen.

_[Human error.]_

He hovers a moment between the door and the living room. But the flat is cold and empty, and the outside world doesn't hold any appeal for him tonight. He sighs, climbs the stairs and tucks himself to bed early, even if he's not working tomorrow. It's the adult, responsible thing to do.

–

By 4 am, he's back downstairs and talking to Billy. Sherlock had been right. The skull is an excellent listener. He never interrupts, never opinionates. The whisky might help, of course.

“I'm sorry I put you into a box that one time,” he admits in a rare moment of vulnerability somewhere between the third and the fourth helping. He's moved Billy to Sherlock's chair because his neck started cramping when he'd kept it twisted towards the mantelpiece. The skull sits comfortably on a pillow now, positioned so that they're facing each other. It's soothing and familiar, and John starts to hope he might actually get some peaceful sleep tonight. But there's this thought he's having, that needs being worked through first.

“It was just,” he continues, because it's important the skull understand this, that he doesn't hold a grudge. Billy is Sherlock's. Billy matters.

“You were,” he tries again, and that's better, that might work. “You were close. To him. And he was forever gone.”

Billy stares at him with the unrivalled patience of a lifeless thing. There are no prompting questions. No one is putting words into his mouth. It's as close to perfect as it's going to get. He takes yet another sip and ploughs on.

“And I was so angry at him, except that I wasn't. Or of course I was, but I was even madder at myself. At how easily he manipulated me. It was complicated. And you were just sitting there, judging me. It was putting you away or smashing you at the end. And I couldn't do that, not ever. Not for his stuff.”

Billy sits on his pillow and lets John stammer his way through the apology. He never did apologise to Sherlock. He's not quite sure if he should, but Billy's here now. It's better than nothing, isn't it? It makes him feel better, in any case. He tries to take a sip, but the glass is empty. When did that happen?

Oh well, maybe that, too, is for the better. He yawns and falls back into his chair.

“Thanks for that,” he concludes. “I think I'll try the bed thing again.”

He's honestly tired now, very tired indeed. Even the idea of walking up the stairs feels overwhelming. He glances at the sofa. Maybe he could just...

But what will Sherlock think when he returns in the morning and finds John on the sofa? No, it's better if he'll just brave the stairs. He rises up from the chair, a bit too fast.

Oops. Maybe that fifth glass was one too many.

Billy stares through the kitchen. John stops, looks that way.

“No,” he decides immediately.

Billy, pointedly, keeps on pointing towards Sherlock's bedroom.

“No,” John repeats. “Mates don't sleep in each others' bed. It's not something you do.”

Billy doesn't seem to care. John glances at the door again, at the sofa, at the stairs. He takes a hesitating step towards the latter, then another.

Somehow he ends up on Sherlock's doorway anyway. Weird.

Well.

Maybe he'll just rest here a bit before continuing upstairs. No big deal. Sherlock will never need to know. It can stay between him and Billy. It's all right, he's pretty sure Billy won't spill.

The sheets are soft and warm and beckoning, everything John isn't. He doesn't stand a chance.

–

A text alert wakes him up at ten. He turns around, groaning. The mattress is too soft. The ceiling is too dark.

Wait a second.

Oh, dammit. 

He actually took the skull's advice. How deranged is that? He still has jeans on, and his jumper, for god's sakes. And his head officially hates him. He frowns at the cheerily bright screen of his phone.

_Complications. Two more days. SH_

Oh _fuck_ this. 

–

At least he has ample time to clean away the evidence. Sherlock will never need to know.

“Don't say a word,” he barks at Billy, who's still innocently sitting on the pillow. The skull grins back at him, and he has to turn it around before he feels adult enough to boil some water for his morning coffee. He tells himself very sternly that he's not moping. It's just the hangover. Just that. Nothing a couple of pills won't fix.

–

John takes the trash out and does the shopping, and it's still only 12 o'clock. He knows this restlessness well. It was his constant companion when his life consisted of the beige walls of his bedsit and the weekly meetings with Ella. After moving to 221B he never had time to be restless again, until Sherlock's suicide, and even then it was broken by the horrible guilt he kept on sinking into.

Is he really so unsure of his standing here that it's creeping back upon him already, after a mere day of being separated from Sherlock? He glances at Billy, but the skull has dutifully stayed where he put it. Everything is exactly where he's put it. It's horrendous.

He toys with his phone, tries to decide how to answer.

 _All right_ just makes him sound like Molly used to be before she grew a backbone.

 _Take care of yourself_ is a mile too sentimental.

 _Come back home you fucking stupid idiot_ is what he'd really want to say, or yell if at all possible.

He stares at the empty screen. Home. This is his home. And not just in some momentarily way. 221B Baker Street is his _home_ , a place where he belongs like he hasn't belonged since childhood. 221B Baker Street with its mutilated walls, its chemistry lab where kitchen should be and its resident madman is his true home.

A memory strikes. Oh God.

He scrolls furiously back, to the very first message that started this whole introspection.

_An errand for Mycroft. I'll come back home for dinner. SH_

Oh sweet Lord in Heaven.

Maybe Sherlock didn't mean it like that. Maybe he didn't mean anything at all. It's William Sherlock Scott bloody Holmes after all. Sherlock the sociopath. Sherlock the manipulator.

A yellow room with its falsely merry occupants surfaces into mind. Sherlock, in the middle of the weirdest wedding speech ever.

_[I never expected to be anybody’s best friend.]_

But he was just playing the audience then, wasn't he, showing off his cleverness. It proves nothing.

John glances at the kitchen, sees another Sherlock there.

_[You... you mean I'm your best... friend?]_

He groans and turns Billy back around, sinks into his armchair. There was, a long while ago, time when he'd honestly believed he knew what Sherlock was, and what he wasn't. _I know you for real_ , he'd said and actually thought so. That John would have been adamant Sherlock's bafflement had been honest, that there had been no manipulation in him then. That John would have given anything to see such an expression on his friend's face.

But that John hadn't lived through the Fall, and the Return, and everything that had followed. The betrayals had kept on stacking. His trust, such as it was, had been stretched too wide. Things slipped through it. Important things.

_I'll come back home for dinner._

How Sherlock had looked at him, when things got bad. How he had looked at him at the wedding, and in Leinster Gardens, and later on. So many times later on. He'd taken John back to 221B, and how screwed did that sound? He'd taken John back. And then he had started to accept touch.

Hell, he had started to _initiate_ touch. And not just any touch. The first time Sherlock had sucked him off they'd both been out of their depth and embarrassed beyond tears. It had been clumsy and terrible, and it had happened again the very next night when John hadn't been able to stop pacing, stop shaking. They'd never talked about it. Sherlock hadn't made him, and so John had, gratefully, decided not to think about it. Just let it happen. One weird thing among many. Nothing for him to worry about.

“Well I'm thinking about it now,” he bites out. Billy gives him a solid grounding stare. Good, loyal Billy. There's not a scratch on him, not a speckle of dust. Sherlock has taken excellent care of him. John blinks.

_[I've told you. I'm trying, but I don't know how. Can't you see me trying?]_

Oh.

Oh _no._

John sits quietly and goes through the last year from this new perspective of a Sherlock who's been told he's loved. A Sherlock who has publicly returned the sentiment, in front of John's bloody wife during their wedding meal for heaven's sake. What sociopath does that? Of course, Sherlock is still the most shameless jerkass John's ever met, but what if he does have human emotions? How does that change the meaning of his actions?

The implications are surprisingly clear. Clear, and devastating. John has to give up many of his most tightly hold beliefs, but when the idea has made a home in his mind there's no stopping it. Sherlock was right about that, too. After all, the Sherlock who once upon a time rebuffed John's clumsy advances had died and come back, a similar yet somehow changed man.

_[John. There's something I should tell you. Something I always meant to say but never have.]_

Violin in the night, sad eyes under bloodied lashes. Resigned acceptance of everything John's thrown at him.

“I'm going mad,” he groans. “I'm actually going mad. The things I'm considering.”

He has the strangest feeling that if Billy still had fingers he'd be seeing a particular one just now.

–

Maybe there's no case. Maybe Sherlock is hiding in some drug den, slowly destroying himself. Maybe he's given up on John and plans to never come back.

“Tell me to shut up,” he demands, but the skull stays silent, keeps on staring at him. Even that voiceless judgement feels too loud. His mind is whirring with impossible thoughts, but the image of Sherlock, curled up on some filthy mattress, his brilliant eyes dimmed, his long limbs twitching, stays on top of it all. John works himself tighter and tighter over it, the phone clutched hard into his palm.

He could just call. But then Sherlock would of course pick up, abrasive and aloof and normal, and John would stutter something irredeemably stupid, and that would be that. But then he'd know. At least he'd know.

It's close to three when he finally does call.

Sherlock doesn't answer. John lets the call continue, and continue, and Sherlock never answers.

He doesn't quite throw up, but it's a near thing.

–

It's nine in the evening when he notices that he hasn't eaten anything today. He drags himself into the kitchen and heats some of yesterday's leftovers, eats it without tasting a thing. What is Sherlock doing just now? Is he hurt? Is he obsessing over some clever case? Does he even remember John exists?

One more call, and then he'll give up for tonight. One more try. Sherlock ignores him, or avoids him, or loves him, but there's someone else he could reach.

Mycroft picks up immediately. This time, John is permitted to ask his question.

“Is he all right?” He gasps, and the line goes eerily quiet.

Oh no. No. Did John cause this? He caused this. He's destroyed it, whatever it is, or would have been. It's gone now anyway.

“I see,” Mycroft murmurs after a horrifying moment, and John doesn't even know if he's talking to him, or Anthea or some random foreign leader with a nuclear arsenal. “Interesting,” the older Holmes continues with a voice that proposes anything but. John is not even surprised when the call ends without a warning. He doesn't really deserve anything better, does he? That night, he crawls back into Sherlock's bed even without the extra liquid courage. It mostly smells like his own dirty, sweaty clothes. Where's Sherlock sleeping tonight? Is Mycroft taking care of him?

Please let Mycroft take care of him.

–

He wakes to steady steps on the stairs. Such familiar sounds. He bolts up to hands and knees just as the bedroom door opens, heart beating wildly in his chest. Sherlock stands on the doorway, relaxed, like the sight of John in his bed is the most natural thing ever. Their gazes meet, hold. The clock ticks a full minute on the wall as John relearns how to breathe. Sherlock is all right. He's all right. There's no wildness in him, no restlessness this time. He really is all right. He's also not coming any closer, offering any words.

Finally, John thinks he understands.

“There was no case,” he states when it becomes clear Sherlock isn't going to make this easy for him. Not that he should. That time has passed.

“No,” Sherlock agrees, voice carefully neutral.

“Where were you?”

“Molly's. She said never again, if you really want to know.”

John considers this. Molly. Of course. No one ever thinks of her, Sherlock's one safe haven.

“You left because I needed that time alone.”

“Yes.” No intonation, no emotion. Just plain answer. John sighs.

“How long were you planning to take?”

A placid shrug of shoulders, the hems of the heavy coat raising and falling in tandem.

“As long as required.”

“Required for what?” John asks, even though he's pretty sure he knows the answer. After all, Billy is still sitting on a pillow on Sherlock's chair, a substitute of the real thing.

“For you to figure it out,” Sherlock nods, and now there's an emotion – doubt and something under it, something softer. “I knew you would. I trust you.”

John offers the most hesitant of smiles. Sherlock trusts him, even after finding him in his own bed? How has John been so blind, so wrapped in his own hurt and guilt? How long has this offer stood? Time to find out. He takes a deep breath, braces himself for the last question, the only one that matters.

It's not easy, allowing this amount of vulnerability into his heart, into his words. He hesitatingly lets his walls down, deserts his eternal quest to be strong. Fiddles with the sheets, lets the cracks of his crumbling beliefs shine through his voice. He doesn't find it easy, this sort of thing. Sherlock knows. When the question finally emerges, it's more a croak than words. Humiliating.

“Are you going to manipulate me for the rest of our lives?”

There. He's finally done it. It's out now. Now to wait for the answer. John stares at the wall beyond Sherlock's head, a soldier on a parade. The clock ticks their seconds away. Hurry.

“If you let me,” Sherlock says, hoarse, and he looks so timid, so hopeful.

A rush of emotion so strong it knocks him breathless, and he realises he's crying. He's finally crying, honest tears, ugly tears, and Sherlock's face is frozen somewhere between shock and alarm, and John feels like he's breaking into million soft pieces under that unsure gaze. He didn't cry after the Fall. He didn't cry after Sherlock came back. He didn't cry after the shooting.

He's bawling like a baby now.

“ _Yes_ ,” he admits, and it feels good, so good. And then Sherlock, who had kept himself perfectly still, carefully distant, is there, arms over his shoulders, tugging him closer. John doesn't try to resist it, ends up splayed over that narrow chest, clutching at the heavy coat and sobbing, sobbing, sobbing. And Sherlock holds him and cradles him and gradually lets himself melt into the rather one-sided embrace. It's not exactly cleansing, but it is exhausting. Thank god they're already in a bed.

This time, John doesn't fight his need to grasp and hold and burrow closer. And contrary to all earlier experiences Sherlock doesn't push him away, doesn't look at him nervously, doesn't hide behind his Work, his self-assigned diagnosis. No, Sherlock just clings to him tighter, and then John realises, Sherlock is crying too. Sherlock is slobbering into his hair and holding him and holding him and holding him, and they're in this together, and it sets off a flurry of tears and declarations and forevers.

This is new. Finally, something is _new_.

“You bastard,” John finally groans. “You damned fool, you beloved bastard.”

“Yes, John?” Sherlock asks, his voice wet and spoiled.

“I forgive you. I'm so sorry, I forgive you. Please, _please,_ forgive me.”

“Yes, John,” answers his Sherlock. “I believe I will.”

**Author's Note:**

> Like a little angst with your breakfast? [Come see](http://tunteeton.tumblr.com/) what I'm cooking next! And please leave a comment!


End file.
